The Words Are Clear, We Don’t Choose

When Christ said in John 15:16 “You did not choose Me, but I choose you…” he didn’t actually mean to say “You did not choose Me, but I choose you, however, first you need to choose to accept Me into your heart."

If a person is going to make a case that the words of Jesus don’t mean what they clearly mean and instead can or should be understood to mean the exact opposite of what is recorded in the text, then the entirety of Scripture is suspect and should not be trusted.

Personally, I want nothing to do with a Bible that is subject to my whims and fanciful imagination.

The 'Post-Church Age' And Other Fairy Tales...

I sometimes hear, in the various mission meetings I attend, that we are now living in a “Post-Church Age.” This phrase has always bothered me a bit not so much for the somewhat weak logic for arriving at such a conclusion which I don’t think can be supported by the most basic examination of church history but rather what invariably follows; a call to change the methods the church catholic has traditionally used to proclaim the Good News, reach the lost, and perform acts of mercy that should naturally flow from a saving faith in Jesus.

I’ve detailed on more than one occasion instances of folks coming into my own congregation in the name of evangelism and making their case that if we just added a seeker friendly worship where secular music is played so as not to frighten away the unchurched. I’ve reported on a Southeastern district presentation that suggested that we give away jars of cookies or jelly in order to get folks to consider giving us a shot as their new church. Nearly all this goofy methodology is put forward because we are told that the ways of preaching , teaching, and reaching the lost no longer work the way it used to because we are in a different time: a “Post-Church Age.”

That’s rubbish plain and simple, more especially for persons who call themselves confessional Lutherans.

Last month I was more than pleased to see that my pastor wrote his newsletter article on the problems of a so called “Post-Church Age” in a manner that is clearer and more succinct than I could ever hope to pen. Enjoy!


The 'Post-Church Age' and Other Fairy Tales...

The stories that we tell can tell a lot about us. The stories you tell your kids about when you were a kid say a lot about you today. The stories you tell about your day go a long way to making or breaking the day of those you tell your stories to. The stories that we tell about ourselves as a church tell a lot about what sort of a church we are...

Lately there's been a story going around among some of the higher-ups in our church. The story is called "the Post-Church or Post-Christian Age," a scary sort of story that goes some- thing like this: "For centuries and centuries we lived in a Western Culture that embraced Christendom. The Church was popular and well liked by the vast majority of the culture. Even those who didn't go to church a lot generally had a positive view of Christianity. The Church had a fairly easy time attracting people to become members. Today it's all changed! Our culture is becoming increasingly secular or atheist or Islamist or hostile to Christianity. So our churches face a bleak future of declining numbers of members, declining resources, and less respect from the world at large. We need to do something! (But we're not exactly sure what...)”

Maybe you've heard this story, or bits and pieces of it. It's usually the preamble to a pan- icky appeal that we must change our worship, our theology, our outreach, or the sky will fall!

I think the story is nonsense. It's certainly not the story Scripture tells of Christ and His Church and the world around us. It isn't the story the church fathers told. Most of all, it isn't even factually accurate. Harry Stout, religious history Professor at Yale University used to ask his classes which they would guess was the most religious generation in America? First guess was usually Revolutionary War. Wrong! Civil War? More than the founding fathers' generation, but far from the prize. The right answer? Our generation (circa 1985) was the most religious in American history! While the number of people who say they are Christian has dipped slightly in the first decade of the 21st century, it's still above all others except the 1980’s-90’s.

In the 4th century AD, Constantine made Christianity legal, and lots of people flocked to Christian churches. But oddly enough, Augustine didn't think the number of Christians had really changed at all from the previous century. That the culture thought the church more fashionable didn't make for more Christians, as far as he could see. Popularity did bring a sharp increase in the heresies fathers like Augustine had to battle-- Pelagians and Arians and Donatists and all kinds of bad apples--who tended for most of that era to be the majority of Christendom!

Luther read in St. Paul (Romans 9-11) that the number of the elect is a constant. It was determined by God before time began, unveiled by Christ on the cross, and isn't affected at all by anything we do or don't do. Our good efforts can't increase the number of people in heaven by even one. Our failures and faux pas cannot reduce the number by a single soul. In Elijah's day there were (according to God's reckoning) only 7,000 in all Israel (population at least a million and probably closer to two or three million) who hadn't bent the knee to Baal. Nothing in Scrip- ture suggests that percentage changes much from age to age.

So the world has mostly always hated the Gospel of the Crucified One. It's always been an acquired taste of the (s)elect few. When people fawn over us, we don't get puffed up. When they scorn us, we don't fret. This age is no more post, pro, or pomo Christian than any other. the faithful still stand where we've always stood--on Christ and His promises alone. The world's hatred or love cannot make or break us, but our fear of what people think of us should certainly embarrass us! The only thing that matters is what Christ Jesus thinks of us--and He reveals that in His pure Gospel and Sacraments on which we stand unafraid, a beacon in a dark world- -the light of which will always draw exactly the right crowd, with no crowding, no worrying, and no fear, only faith in the One who has everything, absolutely everything, in His nail pierced hands...

Ninjasmatic Gifts?

In this video Pastor Fisk of Worldview Everlasting looks at spiritual gifts and talks about the charismatic movement (which just so happens to be alive and well in the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod!

Time Out Episode 92

Dan over at Necessary Roughness has the newest Time Out: Time Out, Episode 92 posted.

The Scripture reading for this episode is Ephesians 2 with commentary from the Kretzmann Commentary Series. The hymn this time is “The Day is Surely Drawing” found on page 508 in the Lutheran Service Book.

From Dan: As the church year nears its end and we look to the world to come, it’s prudent to remind ourselves through the Word that we are saved by grace, not of our own doing, but of the gift of God. There are works for us to do, also a gift from God, but these come after faith is given to us and renders us righteous before God.

If you haven’t stopped in and heard Dan’s Time Out episodes in a bit, do yourself a favor and see how good they are; especially the hymns (which I think he’s been knocking ‘em right out of the park!).

So, be sure to stop by, say howdy, and thank Dan for doing such a great job on Time Out, Episode 92!

Previous Time Out episodes:

Time Out Episode 91
Time Out Episode 90
Time Out Episode 89
Time Out Episode 88
Time Out Episode 87
Time Out Episode 86
Time Out Episode 85

Today’s Quote Of The Day From Leo The Great

Today’s quote of the day is from Leo the Great warning the hearers of his sermon on the Feast of the Nativity (Sermon XXIV.6) and us today as well to be on guard against false teachers who wish to introduce new teachings and doctrines under the “a cloak of piety and chastity” and to remain steadfast in the apostolic faith:

You, dearly beloved, whom I address in no less earnest terms than those of the blessed apostle Peter, “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession,” built on the impregnable rock, Christ, and joined to the Lord our Savior by His true assumption of our flesh, remain firm in the faith, which you have professed before many witnesses and in which you were reborn through the water and the Holy Spirit, and received the anointing of salvation and seal of eternal life. But, “if anyone preaches to you anything besides that which you have learned, let him be anathema”; refuse to put wicked fables before the clearest truth, and what you may happen to read or hear contrary to the rule of the catholic and apostolic creed, judge it altogether deadly and diabolical…. Indeed, they put on a cloak of piety and chastity, but under this deceit they conceal the filthiness of their acts, and from the recesses of their ungodly heart hurl shafts to wound the simple…. A mighty bulwark is a sound faith, a true faith, to which nothing has to be added or taken away, because unless it is one, it is no faith, as the apostle says, “on Lord, one faith, one Baptism, on God and Father of all and through all and in us all.” Cling to this unity, dearly beloved, with minds unshaken, and in it “follow after” all “holiness.” In it carry out the Lord’s commands, because “without faith it is impossible to please God,” and without it nothing is holy, nothing pure, nothing alive, “for the just lives by faith” and he who by the devil’s deception loses it is dead though living, because as righteousness is gained by faith, so, too, by a true faith is eternal life gained, as our Lord says. And this is life eternal, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. May He make you to advance and persevere to the end, who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Spirit, forever and ever. Amen.

- Leo the Great, On the Feast of the Nativity, IV, Sermon XXIV.6

HT: From the always awesome and edifying Treasury of Daily Prayer, which can be purchased through Concordia Publishing House.

The Essentials Of Christianity?

I haven’t posted any of Pastor Fisk’s videos in a while so….

In this video Pastor Fisk of Worldview Everlasting answers the question “What are the essentials of Christianity?” He also has a smidgeon on pietism. Good stuff!

KFUO Wants To Hire A Program Host? Really?

From the there’s no way in Hades that even I could make this up files, this gem was brought to my attention by a friend on Facebook this morning:

KFUO Radio AM Program Host

KFUO Radio Station seeks applicants for a program host for KFUO Radio AM. The program host is responsible for on-air announcing, which may include interviewing, reporting of news, sports, weather, religious and other features as may be required within the broadcast-music or talk formats of KFUO. At the discretion of the director of programming operations, the program host may assist with the programming of KFUO. Responsibilities may include traffic, public service, public affairs, news, features, religious programming, etc. The program host also may assist the development director by personally visiting major donors and prospects. The program host will publicly represent KFUO for the purposes of promotion and development. The program host may assist in the evaluation of KFUO efforts and in the development of long-range plans for the station.

The qualified applicant must be an active member of The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, with demonstrated evidence of support for the church; have a minimum of 5 years of experience in ministries related to The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod; a minimum of five years of credible experience in mass-media-related ministries; and must have a bachelor's degree. The qualified applicant must be able to work as part of a team and be willing to travel.

Now why in the world would KFUO needs themselves a program host?

Now, maybe somebody can help me remember something here; wasn’t it just over two years ago that David Strand, Executive Director for the Board for Communication Services, terminated the employment of the host of KFUO’s most popular host for business or programmatic reasons (if I recall properly the reasoning was always being “updated” and modified) and then replacing the show with another that was “different from “Issues, Etc.,”… in that it doesn’t dwell largely on Lutheran apologetics at a sophisticated level. It still takes its Gospel proclamation seriously, but it finds new ways to capture attention.”? I do recall something like this happening in, oh, around March 2008 or sometime close to that…

So, does anybody know of a qualified radio host that could help out KFUO with some Christ centered, cross focused programming… hmm… I do just happen to know a couple of guys that have some experience with Christian talk radio. I wonder if they ever thought about working for a small radio station owned by the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod? Hmm, I wonder

POTF Blog Of The Week: Bringing the Reformation to Protestantism

The POTF blog of the week has to go to Dr. Gene Edward Veith’s post “Bringing the Reformation to Protestantism” over on his Cranach blog. Martin Luther once said the church is always in need of a reformation. In his post, Dr. Veith lays out but a few points to make the case that Dr. Luther’s point is just as applicable and valid today as it was almost five hundred years ago.

From the post:


The original Reformation, whose anniversary we mark on October 31, began in 1517 as an attempt to bring medieval Catholicism back to the Gospel, the Bible, and Vocation. It has occurred to me that today the various Protestant churches need that same Reformation.

THE GOSPEL. Luther nailed his theses on the church door to challenge the practice of selling indulgences. In effect, people were told to give their money to the church, whereupon they would get to go straight to eternal happiness in Heaven. Today, in many Protestant churches, people are being told to give their money to the church, whereupon they are told that they will get health, wealth, and temporal happiness in this world. But the Prosperity Gospel is not the Gospel!

Neither is the Social Gospel of the liberal mainline Protestants, which construe the Kingdom of Heaven as an earthly utopia. Neither is the Social Gospel of many conservative churches, which construe the Kingdom of Heaven as an American civil religion.

In sophisticated theological circles, both of mainline Protestants and among a surprising number of evangelicals, the Gospel has to do with inclusion, of being accepted into the church community. The “New Perspective on Paul” says that the Apostle did not teach justification by grace through faith apart from the Law, as Protestants used to all agree. Rather, by “Law,” he just meant the setting aside of the Judaic ceremonial law. He was concerned with inclusiveness, of allowing Gentiles to become full members of the church alongside of Jews. Not salvation from the guilt and sin that comes from violating the moral law. Similarly, the business of the church today should be including everybody, not proclaiming a supernatural salvation grounded in redemption from sin.

The actual Gospel is the good news that Jesus Christ has, through His life, death, and resurrection, atoned for the sins of the world. The Protestantism that has drifted away from this Gospel is in need of Reformation.

THE BIBLE. Medieval Catholicism did believe in the Bible. They just didn’t use it much. Today’s mainline Protestants don’t believe in it at all. Many conservative Protestants believe in it–acknowledging its authority, inerrancy and all–but they have stopped reading it in their services and their sermons sometimes have not a shred of Scripture in them. Instead, the preaching is about self-help, pop psychology, politics, or generic inspiration. Sometimes the message is “believe in yourself” or even “have faith in yourself.”

The Reformers taught that the Word of God is not only authoritative, but a means of Grace. They preached the Law, to bring their listeners to repentance, and then they proclaimed the Gospel of free forgiveness in Christ. In the words of Walther, they preached faith into their listeners’ hearts.

The Protestantism that has drifted away from the Word of God is in need of Reformation.

You can read the rest here.

A blessed Reformation Day ya’ll!

Is Baptism Necessary?

Pastor Jonathon Fisk from over at Worldview Everlasting answers the question “Is Baptism necessary?” in his latest video.

PowerPoint In Church

Dr. Gene Edward Veith over at his Cranach blog had a post up on Monday titled “PowerPoint corrupts absolutely” in which he highlights a critique of PowerPoint by Edward Tufte in the magazine Wired. From the linked article Tufte writes:

Imagine a widely used and expensive prescription drug that promised to make us beautiful but didn’t. Instead the drug had frequent, serious side effects: It induced stupidity, turned everyone into bores, wasted time, and degraded the quality and credibility of communication. These side effects would rightly lead to a worldwide product recall.

Yet slideware -computer programs for presentations -is everywhere: in corporate America, in government bureaucracies, even in our schools. Several hundred million copies of Microsoft PowerPoint are churning out trillions of slides each year. Slideware may help speakers outline their talks, but convenience for the speaker can be punishing to both content and audience. The standard PowerPoint presentation elevates format over content, betraying an attitude of commercialism that turns everything into a sales pitch.

So, Tufte is making a case that PowerPoint is nothing more than a bullet driven commercial sales pitch. As somebody who has had to sit through what seems endless hours of PowerPoint presentations on the exciting world of metrology and measurement uncertainties in relation to mass standards, I couldn’t agree more with Tufte’s assessment that often such presentations are merely a “pushy style (that) seeks to set up a speaker’s dominance over the audience” and rarely is useful in actually conveying information or teaching.

I was actually somewhat surprised that nobody on Dr. Veith’s blog brought up the copious use of PowerPoint in many of today’s churches. Heck, has anyone been to what passes for mission churches lately? Without projectors scrolling the words of Days of Elijah to croon along with the band and/or giving the seekers something pithy to fill in on their sermon outlines, most of these soul willing congregations would be lost as an SED mystic thumbing through a Pauline epistle (trust me, you don’t get more lost than that!).

But is there an actual problem with PowerPoint being used in churches or missions or is the issue one of aesthetics? I would argue the former and not the latter.

For the last ten years consultants and church growth experts have made repeated claims that the church must look as much like the culture as possible so as to attract the unchurched seekers that, we are told, stay away from church because it is foreign to them. What better way to blend into the culture than adopting the basic sales tool of corporate America?

But as Tufte points out in his piece; PowerPoint has little to do with actual teaching or conveying of useful information but rather “PowerPoint’s pushy style seeks to set up a speaker’s dominance over the audience. The speaker, after all, is making power points with bullets to followers.” Tufte goes so far as to suggest that it would be better for children burdened with teachers who insist on using PowerPoint “if the schools simply closed down on those days and everyone went to the Exploratorium or wrote an illustrated essay explaining something.” Do we think less of churches that should be caring for our immortal souls than we do of schools?

With Scriptural literacy and Biblical understanding at a point in this country that even atheists and agnostics seem to have a better understanding the Christian faith than do Christians, we don’t need to be dumbing anything down but rather we should be ramping up catechetical instruction like nobody’s business. We need to start believing the apostle Paul (I know this will be difficult for the more mystic minded SED employee) when he says in Romans 10:17

So faith comes by hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.


Notice that the apostle didn’t say write spiffy pamphlets or slideshows with easy to read bullet points. Faith for us poor miserable sinners comes through the preached word! Believe it, it’s true! If faith came by reading bullet points wouldn’t the new atheists (who know Scripture better that most Christians but choose to reject it as foolishness or mythology) believe this Good News and be saved? Does anybody seriously think that Christopher Hitchens or Richard Dawkins are going to come to faith through a Sunday morning PowerPoint presentation? If not, then why would we expect a dissimilar result when we subject the unchurched seeker to the same? Do we really expect the faithful believer’s faith to be sustained through a PowerPoint presentation? If the answer to that question is yes, I would love to hear someone honestly try to make his or her case from Scripture or the Lutheran Confessions. Really, I would pay some serious coin to hear that apologetic argument.

So just stop with the PowerPoint nonsense in churches folks! No matter what they told you in your church worker’s outreach extension course at Concordia University in Cowsbreath, the sacrament of PowerPoint saves nobody and entertains even fewer. On top of that, such goofiness during a Sunday service only ends up endangering the rescued kittens of a certain slack jawed yokel blogger (see embedded picture to see what’s at stake) and nobody wants that… do they?

The Quote of The Week From A Friend On Facebook

Today’s quote of the week is from one of my friends on Facebook:

__________ My Master doesn't pat me on the head and give me treats for obedience-tricks.

I listen to a lot of sermons and hear a goodly number of church leaders who falsely teach their people that our Lord’s gifts are certainly free but we need to do something to tap into the Divine gift registry before we can fully enjoy the benefits of the Christian Life. In other words, God works on the quid pro quo system.

What does this line of thinking usually sound like you ask? When God's grace and His gifts are based on such a system: "if you just believe or if you have enough faith then God will ______ " just fill in the blank. In doing this, these church leaders have turned the Lord of heaven and earth and our Creator and Redeemer into a puppet on a string who dances to whatever tune we want. This is not the picture Scripture paints.

And so we are all perfectly clear, Lutherans are not immune to this false teaching. In fact, when not guided by Scripture and our Confessions, Lutheran excel at latching onto just about any heresy and making it their own. Whether it is evangelism that says we are sending people hell if we don’t change the way we conduct our worship services or mystic prayer practices taught by people who think the apostle Paul is overrated and therefore prefers mystics whose theology Scripture and our Confessions condemn; Lutherans have a unique way of wrapping heresy in enough pious language so as to make it appear orthodox at first glance.

Today’s quote is brilliant in its simplicity and condemns each one of us who thinks we do something so God will pat us on the head. The funny thing is that such thinking normally has us patting God on the head for His trick performed exactly the way we wanted Him to.

Reformation Week 2010 On Issues, Etc.

My favorite talk show for the thinking Christian, Issues, Etc., is celebrating reformation week next week with a series of special programming segments and guests. Do yourself a favor and tune in for what looks like a great week of learning and catechesis by some of the most knowledgeable guests available anywhere. If you are not able to tune in live, go to either the on-demand page or iTunes and download the podcasts like I do (believe you me that Todd, Jeff, and Craig love their on-demand listeners and don’t mind at all if you are not able to tune in when they broadcasting live!)

According to the Issues, Etc. support page it looks like the schedule will be as follows:

Monday, October 18
The Doctrine of Justification with Dr. Carl Fickenscher of Concordia Theological Seminary

Tuesday, October 19
The Means of Grace with Pr. Paul McCain of Concordia Publishing House

Wednesday, October 20
The Theology of the Cross with Dr. Scott Murray of Memorial Lutheran-Houston, TX

Thursday, October 21
Vocation & Two Kingdom Theology with Dr. Steven Hein of the Concordia Institute for Christian Studies

Friday, October 22
Worship with Pr. Will Weedon of St. Paul Lutheran Church-Hamel, IL

Like I said, the most knowledgeable guests available anywhere!

Finally, I would encourage everyone to prayerfully consider supporting Issues, Etc. by become a member of the Reformation Club and ask the members of your individual congregations to support Issues, Etc. as part of your mission or outreach budget.

Critical Thinking And The Double Standard Of Acceptable Formal Principles

Some random thoughts on critical thought…

Critical thinking for the Christian is never suspended but rather presupposed.

It is customary and unobjectionable for the agonistic, atheist, or rationalist to bring hypothesis and conjecture to the table in a manner not afforded to anyone who confesses Scripture as being authoritative.

While comprehending the latter, Christians in our western post modern culture are rarely perceptive of the former.

The rationalist is the most dangerous person to the critical thinking Christian as he disguises his unbelief in words that appear to originate or stem from Scripture and in doing so convinces the Christian to terminate true critical thought for false presuppositions.

The critical thinking Christian is in fact rational and does not accept the double standard which necessitates that Scripture be set aside or repudiated solely on the basis that such a book is divinely inspired while equations and theories of men are allowed to advance uncontested.

The Serpent In The Rationalist’s Garden of Eden

Today’s Issues. Etc. soundbite of the day comes from Dr. Alister McGrath of Oxford University commenting on religion being the serpent in the rationalist’s Garden of Eden back on October 1, 2010.

I normally wait a week before posting a soundbite but Dr. McGrath’s observation is brilliant and his characterization of the unbeliever’s frustration with religion seducing away what seem to be otherwise intelligent people mirrored my own thinking perfectly when I was an atheist for close to fifteen years.

The entire interview with Dr. McGrath can be listened to here.

The Method Is Umm....

Pastor Jonathon Fisk from over at Worldview Everlasting explains Methodism and has a quick look at the center of Lutheranism (which is in Africa and not America or Germany) and what our brothers over there truly need.